


Separation

by luoup (ravenic)



Series: Team the Best Team [Platonic VLD Week 2.0] [6]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Platonic VLD Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2017-07-04
Packaged: 2018-11-28 07:19:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11412987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravenic/pseuds/luoup
Summary: Day 3 Prompt 2: SeparationVoltron is shattered





	Separation

**Author's Note:**

> an update: so this is probably pretty obvious, but i am quite behind in posting Platonic Week fills. so for the rest of the week, probably only one fill a day will be posted instead of my attempted two. all the prompts are going to be written, but i am on vacation and we keep going and doing things so i can't just sit and write, and i wasn't organized enough to get much completed before the week actually started... 
> 
> so: only one fic a day most likely, but hopefully they'll be better-quality, and the rest will come soon after! 
> 
> also, a quick warning that this one's a little darker. nothing really terribly awful happens, but it's probably the darkest of the Platonic Week fills that i'm doing. everyone's okay in the end, but it's not a fun time for anybody.

As she stared at the growing mass of energy, Allura couldn’t help but feel the beginnings of a deep, intense horror. “Coran, what is that?”

He looked as concerned as she felt. “I don’t know, Princess, but it looks to be of Druid make, which can’t be a good thing.” The mechanic leaned over and pressed the button to contact Voltron. “Paladins, avoid that weapon. I think–”

He never had time to finish. The charging flickers of energy coalesced into a massive crackling bolt of purple lightning, and the Alteans could do nothing but watch in horror as it struck Voltron in the throat. There was a brilliant flash, purple washing out all other light, and when it faded, the giant robot warrior had been broken apart. Each Lion drifted, crumpled, in the void, lightless and lifeless as violet sparks crawled across their metal skins.

 _“No!”_ Allura’s cry blurred with Coran’s strangled whisper as they stared at the scene in shock. Voltron was not meant to separate unless the Paladins and Lions intended for it, and this way – a violent rending by an enemy weapon, especially one with Druid origins – was the absolute worst-case scenario. This… this could be fatal, for the powerful Lions themselves, and even moreso for their fragile Paladins.

The ship that had fired the weapon had apparently not been quite prepared – the activation seemed to have knocked all the power out on board; not a single light illuminated the blocky Galra craft. That was the only good thing about all this, that the enemy had taken itself out with the strike, but that only attested to the power of that lightning bolt and the damage it could have done to Voltron.

“No, no, oh no oh no oh no,” Allura murmured frantically, hands fluttering over the controls with no idea of what to do or how to help, how to protect her Paladins.

“Bring them back,” Coran commanded hoarsely, already moving. “Use the trac-beam, one at a time into the main hangar. Then we’ll open a wormhole to… to anywhere. Anywhere that isn’t here. They will be all right, we’ll get them.” When the princess just stared at him, the mechanic snapped, “Now, Allura!” and took off to the engine rooms. For such fine moving of a tractor beam someone would have to be present to adjust controls, much as he wanted to run to the hangar and grab each Paladin as soon as they returned. Allura surely wanted the same, but she had her own job to do. It would be all right. The Paladins would be all right. They had to be.

* * *

They had seen it coming. Maybe that was the worst part. They had watched that lightning charge up, illuminating the space around them and reflecting off of the walls of the Galra ship and the shield of the Castle of Lions, but they still hadn’t gotten out of the way in time.

It wasn’t Shiro’s fault, it wasn’t. But the sight of the purple Druid-like lightning had frozen the Voltron leader in paralytic fear, and his panic had echoed down through the body, and they had all been a little frazzled already from the fight, and… they didn’t quite dodge. The lightning had struck. Everything had turned purple, and then white, and then the universe had stopped existing for a little while.

When Hunk blinked his eyes open, the cockpit was dark around him. Not even backup lights were illuminated. “Yellow?” he mumbled, sitting slowly upright. “What happened?”

No response. The Lion was silent around him.

Really, really silent. No click of machinery, no hum of electricity, not even the mental feeling of being sat on by a particularly large, satisfied cat, which was how Yellow tended to announce herself.

Nothing.

“Guys? Hello, anybody?” _Ridiculous, Hunk. The comms aren’t going to work either._

“Oh, heck,” the Yellow Paladin mumbled very quietly. The silence around him did not respond. Neither did anyone else.

It felt like a century passed before the tractor beam caught Yellow and began to move her, but it could only have been a few minutes. Hunk hadn’t even figured out what to do to try to fix this. It was hard to get a giant magical robot Lion going again when it was totally dead in open space. The trac-beam itself caused a moment of panic before he realized that it belonged to the castleship and not the Galra. After that, Hunk just let the castle draw him back, trying to shake out the tingling feeling from his limbs and ignore his blooming headache. He felt like he had a weird awful hangover plus some kind of awful feeling like his brain hadn’t quite gone back into his body, like a mechanical belt that had snapped and just kept spinning.

The lightning had been more than just electricity, that was for sure. But what it had done to the Lions, and more worryingly their very fragile human Paladins, or what the spontaneous forced separation of Voltron and accompanying severing of the mindlink had done, would only be shown in time.

By the time the tractor beam drew Yellow into the castleship’s main hangar, Hunk was fighting a feeling of nausea. He felt like his head was at once squeezingly tiny and far too large, and every movement was awkward and floppy. Even his eyes hurt.

Once his Lion had been safely deposited, Hunk pried the cockpit door open as gently as he could since Yellow was… unavailable to help open it, and staggered out into the hangar. The four other Lions were there too, and none of them looked any better than Yellow. Actually, Green and Red somehow looked worse, and there was something deeply unnatural about the way Black lay so limply on the ground, unlit and unmoving.

“Guys?” Hunk croaked. Where was everyone? “Is everyone okay? Where are you?”

“Hunk!” The voice was distant but Hunk immediately knew it as Lance. The Blue Lion’s cockpit door bumped, jerked, and then wobbled as the Paladin within struggled to open the mechanism. Hunk staggered over, and between the two of them something released and the door sprang open.

Lance flung himself out of Blue and toppled into Hunk’s arms. “Oh my god holy shit what the hell was that,” he panted, pressing himself as close as physically possible.

Hunk squeezed him even closer. “I have no idea,” he murmured, tucking his nose against Lance’s hair.

“This feels… I don’t even know the word for it. It’s awful. Whatever happened, I don’t like it,” Lance grumbled, shuddering a little. “It feels gross _inside._ Like something separated where it shouldn’t have, in my head. What does that even mean?”

Hunk sighed. “I don’t know. I think it’s because the lightning separated us when we were Voltron. Our minds link when we form up, maybe it’s not supposed to come apart like that.”

They both jumped when the hangar loudspeakers came on and Coran’s voice came crackling into the room. “Paladins, if you can hear me, you are all safe and back in the castle. Allura and I are working to jump us to a safer location and we’ll be there as soon as possible. We… we’re not sure what condition you all are in, but if you can move try to get out of the Lions and safely to the ground. We will be there as soon as we can.” The speakers went silent.

 _Uh oh._ Coran being actually openly worried was essentially cause for panic.

No time for panicking. Hunk and Lance were for the most part alright, aside from the weird twisty feeling in their stomachs and the discomfort in their heads like something was missing, a feeling like you’d hit your head just a bit too hard without ever actually touching anything. But they were only two-fifths of Voltron – the lower two-fifths, and the lightning had hit right between Shiro, Keith, and Pidge. _If I feel this bad and I’m a Leg,_ Hunk thought, concern growing like the start of a forest fire, _then how –_

_No time for panicking. Get the others._

Lance had the same idea. “Hunk, go get Pidge. I’ll find Keith, and then we’ll go for Shiro if he’s not out by then,” the Blue Paladins said shortly, untangling himself reluctantly from his best friend and setting off running for the Red Lion. Hunk shook the strained, sparkly feeling from his mind and did the same, heading for Green.

He found Green’s Paladin, but his worry had been correct – the higher Lions had taken a harder hit. Pidge wasn’t in the pilot seat but pressed into a corner, hands pressed to the sides of her head and shaking like a leaf in an earthquake.

“Pidge?” No response. Hunk made to go closer, but the movement made the other Paladin flinch violently and he opted to crouch down instead. “Hey, Pidge. I don’t really know what just happened, but I promise we’re safe now. Can I come over there?”

Nothing for a moment, then Pidge nodded slowly and Hunk was able to scoot closer without any negative reactions. His skin felt like it had sparks or spiders or particularly creepy feathers crawling across him, and something felt cracked, fragile in his head. If he and Lance felt like this, wobbly and blurry and trembly, he couldn’t imagine the effects that Pidge and Keith must be feeling, much less Shiro who had already been freaking out about the Druid-like lightning.

With no warning, Pidge flung herself into Hunk’s arms, burrowing against him the way Lance had before. “What _is_ this,” she whispered in a strangled voice, shaking so hard that Hunk almost shook too.

“I don’t know,” he mumbled, wrapping both arms around her. He hated having to say that over and over, but none of them knew anything right now. “I don’t know, but we’ll be okay. Come on, let’s go find Lance and Keith; I think we’ll all feel better when we’re together again.”

“This isn’t supposed to happen,” Pidge murmured as Hunk stood, hefting her in his grip. The Green Paladin wasn’t in any condition to walk. “This isn’t supposed to happen, we aren’t supposed to break like that, we…”

“I know,” he said, walking slowly and carefully. Maybe he shouldn’t be carrying someone, as weak and dizzy as he felt, but Pidge was surely worse and Hunk needed to do _something._ Besides, he felt just a little bit better with someone close like this, so it all turned out.

By the time they made it out of Green’s cockpit, Hunk was feeling considerably worse. Pidge hadn’t stopped shaking and her uneven, shuddery breath in his ear was only reinforcing how bad this really was.

Lance and Keith didn’t look much better. The right-side team was sitting against the Red Lion as if neither of them had had the energy to go any farther. Lance was pale, controlling his breathing rigidly. Maybe the clearest sign of how bad things were was that Keith had his face pressed against Lance’s shoulder, and rather than shove his pseudo-rival away, the Blue Paladin had his arms wrapped around the other.

Keith was mumbling something. As Hunk approached he heard it more clearly, “– where are you, where are you, I can’t find you, he’s gone, where are they, where…”

Lance looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps, and from the look on his face when he saw Hunk, the Yellow Paladin didn’t appear much better than Lance did. “I hate this,” he said quietly, and Hunk could only agree.

“We still need to get Shiro,” he said instead. The last Paladin hadn’t yet emerged from the Black Lion. If their luck was going to keep going like this, he was probably even worse off than the Arms were.

Lance closed his eyes and let out a breath. Then he opened them and got to his feet, not quite able to hide how he swayed upon standing. Keith let out a noise of distress that sounded dangerously close to a mewl and grabbed at Lance’s leg with one shaking hand, whispering words that Hunk couldn’t hear and wasn’t sure he wanted to.

“Keith, look. Pidge is here too, she’s staying with you. Lance and I will be right back, and Shiro will be with us.” Hunk placed Pidge beside her fellow arm with no small amount of protest – she didn’t seem to understand what was happening or want to let go– but once beside each other the two curled up like bedraggled kittens. Keith had gone back to hiding against Pidge’s neck, but she watched them with faded eyes as the Legs went across the hangar to where the Black Lion was lying lifeless, pried open the cockpit door, and entered.

Hunk hated being right. He really, really hated it.

By the time Hunk and Lance got their team leader out of his Lion, Hunk’s head was spinning and so was his stomach. Shiro had struggled against them but weakly, barely recognizing his own teammates, and Hunk had had to practically carry Shiro the way he’d done with Pidge back to where the others were waiting. Whatever he had recognized about the Druid-like lightning had sent Shiro spiraling deep into a flashback, which had not been helped by the mind-wrenching splintering of Voltron immediately after.

They finally made it back all together, and not a moment too soon. It couldn’t have been more than half an hour since the Galra weapon had discharged, but Hunk felt like he’d had a fever for days. Whatever this… post-drift-break feeling was, it was terrible. His body hurt and his brain hurt more. They would need to figure out what exactly had happened and do something to keep it from happening again, but that could wait until he didn’t feel like passing out.

The others were no better. At the sight of Shiro, Keith hauled himself to his feet and staggered over to them, falling into his brother with enough force to nearly knock both of them back to the ground. Pidge tried to do the same but didn’t quite make it upright, tipping back down to lean heavily against Red’s side, watching with desperate half-focused eyes. While Hunk kept the smushed-together Keith-and-Shiro from falling down, Lance went to Pidge and together the two of them weaved and wobbled their way back to the others.

Standing was generally just a bad idea though, what with the dizziness that was overwhelming Hunk’s vision and probably was the same or worse for the rest, and so the five ended up in a mostly-seated tangle on the ground. Keith wouldn’t let go of Shiro, whispering, “I found you, I found you,” over and over, but his other hand was holding so tightly to Pidge’s that the skin had turned bone-white. Pidge herself had pressed her forehead hard against Shiro’s back before leaning sideways so that she could reach both Hunk and Lance. Hunk wasn’t sure if it was him holding onto Lance or the other way around, but it didn’t feel like it was going to let up anytime soon. Lance was petting Pidge’s hair with his free hand, leaning against Hunk with all of his weight. Hunk felt marginally better being close to the other Paladins again, but his head still hurt so he gave up thinking and tucked his face into Lance’s neck, trying to remember how to breathe properly and stop his head from spinning.

* * *

An indeterminable amount of time later, Coran and Allura came dashing into the hangar, nearly tripping over their own feet in their haste. They found five blacked-out Lions and five exhausted, mindlink-sick Paladins heaped into a pile in the middle.

Coran feared the unknown effects the healing pods could have on something like this, so his only suggestion was to move the Paladins somewhere more comfortable and hope they could sleep this off. In a cheery voice that ran paper-thin, he observed that since they’d survived the initial blast, the humans would likely all be right as raxors in a while.

Allura bit at her lip and watched her team with wide, worried eyes, but she could think of nothing else to do, so she helped Coran half-carry the five into a low-lit common room and cover them up with blankets. Even momentary separation seemed to distress them even more, and Keith actually tried to hit her when she tugged him away from Shiro, though the blow went incredibly wide and he nearly fell back down just from the attempt. Shiro himself could barely move at all, and in the end Coran had to just scoop him up and carry the Paladin on his own.

Once they were settled, limp and hurting and far too quiet, Allura stood there staring at them until Coran took her hand. “They’ll be alright, Princess,” he murmured. “Let them sleep awhile; reset, as it were. That might help the damage the break did to the mindlink as well. They aren’t formed up as Voltron now, but I believe the physical closeness is helping. Sleep can do a great deal, you know. Let them rest, and we’ll see them soon.” He led the girl who was all but his daughter from the room to work on engine repairs until their team had recovered. Anything to distract them from the worry.

Pressed skin-close together, warm under blankets and safe in a quiet room, the Paladins were finally able to rest. The effects of that terrible violet lightning, the rending both physically of lions and mentally of bond had not fully faded – and might not for a while, though hopefully there would be no lasting damage.

But being together was helping. Even though they still trembled and panted, hearts racing and heads pounding, even though it still felt like they had taken a direct hit to their very minds, they were safe and together. Wounds healed – they were living examples of that. Whatever that lightning had been, whatever it had done to them, they would get through it together. It would not bring them down.

Shiro did not dream of purple and crackling electrical sparks. He floated in a green ocean, basking in yellow sunlight as a blue sky filled with stars dreamed over him. This was a dream, so the red flames glowing gently on the surface of the waves was nothing to fear. It was warm.

Keith dreamt of nothing at all. He had his brother by his side (safe, not gone, he’d been found, _Keith_ had been found) and his team around him. He was not alone. The danger was gone. They were not lost. He slept.

Pidge had lost too many people too recently to have taken well to the sudden, forcible removal of four others from her own mind. But she could feel them around her, Lance’s foot and Keith’s arm and Hunk’s side and somewhere nearby the sound of Shiro snoring, and even though the jellylike feeling that remained in her mind still made her shiver, she knew that she was safe, and that they were too.

Lance could see all of the others, feel them all around him. They had been torn from his mind with a horrific rending sensation he didn’t think he would ever fully forget, but he’d gotten them back. Together, they could get through this. They weren’t going away, and neither was he.

Hunk had been so desperately worried, so afraid that that lightning and the damage it did might be the thing that finally broke Voltron. But he’d gotten them all back. They were all right here, Shiro snoring, Lance making weird little hums every time he breathed out, Keith pressed so close to Shiro that he had nearly grown into the Black Paladin’s side but still reaching out for the others in a search to make sure they were _all_ still with him, Pidge silent where she was tucked against Hunk’s side but breathing deeply and slowly. They were okay. Hunk could rest, because he had them back. They would be all right.

The Galra’s lightning weapon had ripped Voltron apart and splintered the mindlink its five Paladins shared. They could have died. But they did not. The forced separation had hit their minds hard, sharp and unexpected, but now they were all together and asleep, and when they woke their bodies would feel less weakened, less trembly, and the holes in their minds would not feel quite as large or as ragged.

Voltron would come back together once again.

**Author's Note:**

> i... don't feel like i quite captured what i was going for in this. + rushed the ending because i'm falling asleep. 
> 
> oh well. that's all i got. 
> 
> don't get struck by galra lightning, folks. it's a bad time.


End file.
